GOOD NEWS

Peter Lawford and June Allyson

GOOD NEWS (1947). Director: Charles Walters.

Love is in the air at Tait University. Beef (Loren Tindall) is crazy about Babe (Joan McCracken), but she only has eyes for skinny Bobby (Ray McDonald). Connie (June Allyson) is smitten with football hero, Tommy (Peter Lawford), but he pangs for a new student, the pretentious, money-hungry, French (mis)quoting Pat (Patricia Marshall). Pat resists Tommy because she thinks the stuffy Peter Van Dyne III (Robert E. Strickland) has much more money. Considering who the stars of the picture are, it's no secret who will wind up with whom.

Patricia Marshall and Peter Lawford

Good News is a remake of a 1930's musical that was based on a Broadway show from the twenties. The plot -- such as it is -- was silly and insubstantial for 1930 let alone 1947, so the movie has to get by on its charm, its cast and its music. Neither Peter Lawford nor June Allyson can really sing -- Lawford is especially horrible to listen to; even his speaking voice is overly nasal -- and the other cast members don't have such dulcet tones, either, although Marshall is okay and McCracken (who was on Broadway in Rodger and Hammerstein's Me and Juliet) at least has personality and a voice best described as flavorful. Then there are the songs [De Sylva/Henderson/Brown].

Varsity Drag

Some of the songs are instantly forgettable, but there are a few that stay in the memory. "The Best Things in Life are Free" is, of course, a well-known standard, but there's also "Lucky in Love," as well as "Pass That Peace Pipe", "Just Imagine" and "Varsity Drag," which is the movie's liveliest production number. The performances across the board are all good, even though hardly anyone looks like a college kid with maybe the exception of 27-year- old McDonald. Allyson is certainly much more appealing in this than the rather freakish Penny Singleton in the 1930 version. Lawford has enough charm to get by even though he is hardly perfect casting. Others in the cast include Mel Torme as a student, Connie Gilchrist as a house mother, Donald MacBride as a rapacious coach, and Clinton Sundberg as a French teacher. Patricia Marshall did not appear in another movie for 28 years; she appeared primarily on the stage. McDonald only lived until 37 and McCracken died at 43.

Verdict: Mindless kitsch but fun if you're in the mood. **3/4. 

THE BARKLEYS OF BROADWAY

Ginger Rogers, Oscar Levant, Fred Astaire

THE BARKLEYS OF BROADWAY (1949). Director: Charles Walters.

Josh and Dinah Barkley (Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers) have been a top team on Broadway for several years, but all is not rosy in their lives backstage. Secretly Dinah is a bit tired of her husband's Svengali-like attitude and his criticisms, as well as the feeling he has that he "made" her. When a very handsome playwright named Jacques Barredout (Jacques Francois) insists that Dinah has great and untapped dramatic talent, she decides to try her hand at playing Sarah Bernhardt in his new play. Will she fall on her face, and how will Josh feel if she does? Barkleys presents Astaire and Rogers in absolute top form, and this is one of their most winning movies. As their friend and collaborator, Oscar Levant [The Cobweb] offers one of his better performances, although the device of pairing him off with one beautiful woman after another becomes tiresome. Levant was an oddity -- he couldn't sing or dance, and certainly wasn't good-looking -- but his sardonic delivery often works, and he is allowed to play the piano on excerpts from two pieces, Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" and Tchaikovsky's "Piano Concerto No. 1." If Barkleys falls down in one respect it's that the new songs by Harry Warren and Ira Gershwin aren't up to the standard set by Ira and George Gershwin -- the only melodic bright spot is Gershwin's old tune "They Can't Take That Away from Me." Astaire's smooth elegant dancing is much on display, especially in a number when he trips the light fantastic with dozens of pairs of animated dancing shoes. The supporting cast includes Billie Burke [Three Husbands], who is wasted as a talkative patroness of the arts; Hans Conreid [Juke Box Rhythm] as an avant garde artist who draws Dinah as if she were a pancake (!); and George Zucco, who appears on stage during the Sarah Bernhardt sequence. Clinton Sundberg and Gale Robbins also appear, with Robbins playing Dinah's excitable Southern understudy; she's swell. Jacques Francois is now little-known except for this picture, but he amassed 150 credits, mostly in French productions, and he makes a good impression in this.

I believe this was the last time Astaire and Rogers were teamed in a movie, There was actually a ten year gap between Barkleys and their previous film, The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle. Lest one wonder if the real Rogers felt like Dinah does in this movie, we must remember that Rogers had already proven her dramatic acting chops in several previous films -- and she won the Best Actress Oscar for Kitty Foyle in 1941 -- so this was not a case of art imitating life.

Verdict: Delightful musical with the inimitable team of Rogers and Astaire. ***. 

DANGEROUS WHEN WET

Fernando Lamas and Esther Williams

DANGEROUS WHEN WET (1953). Director: Charles Walters.

Katie Higgins (Esther Williams) belongs to a very healthy Arkansas family whose farm needs a lot of improvement. Along comes Windy Weebe (Jack Carson), who hawks a dubious product known as Liquipep. Katie is able to resist Windy's all-too-obvious advances, but she decides to let Liquipep sponsor her whole family in a race to swim the English Channel. While getting in training both in England and France, Katie meets a wealthy French playboy named Andre (Fernando Lamas of The Lost World), but his pursuit of her may endanger her chances of winning the race. Dangerous When Wet is a very entertaining and amiable pic with a funny script by Dorothy Kingsley and very good performances from Williams and the rest of the cast, which includes William Demarest and Charlotte Greenwood [Up in Mabel's Room] as Katie's parents; Denise Darcel as the very buxom French entry Gigi; and Barbara Whiting [Fresh from Paris] as Katie's younger sister, Suzie, who warbles "I Like Men." The bouncy, pleasant score is by Arthur Schwartz and Johnny Mercer, and also includes "I Got Outa Bed," "My Wildest Dreams;" and "Ain't Nature Great." Williams doesn't have a bad voice, and while Lamas can carry a tune, his tones are not exactly dulcet. The film has two major highlights: Charlotte Greenwood going into her dance with such obvious joy and kicking up her heels like she's double-jointed; and the suspenseful climax when Katie desperately tries to make it across the twenty miles of the channel, which is filmed in harrowing detail. Another bright moment is a sequence when Williams has a dream of being underwater with the cartoon characters Tom and Jerry, as well as a grabby octopus that is meant to represent Lamas. When the Higgins family first gets to England, the business with all of the fog is funny but causes eye strain after awhile.Williams married Lamas sixteen years after this film was made and they remained together until his death.

Verdict: Possibly Williams' best picture, and an unqualified delight. ***.

THE BELLE OF NEW YORK

Marjorie Main and Fred Astaire

THE BELLE OF NEW YORK (1952). Director: Charles Walters.

In Olde New York footloose Charlie Hill (Fred Astaire of Royal Wedding) is about to walk out of yet another wedding that his wealthy aunt (Marjorie Main) will have to pay for -- or rather, pay the bride off for -- but he may have finally found the right gal in pretty Angela (Vera-Ellen of White Christmas). Angela works for the Daughters of Right, a Salvation Army-type charity and faith organization that was founded by the late Phineas Hill, Charlie's uncle. When Mrs. Hill learns that her nephew and Angela have fallen in love, she doesn't know whether to be delighted or appalled, but true love will not be denied -- or run smoothly. The Belle of New York got its start as a 19th century operetta and was tossed around as a possible production for years until former dancer and choreographer Charles Walters got the assignment to direct it and practically disavowed the picture in later years. The movie may be a trifle, but it's a charming and entertaining trifle decked out in gorgeous TechniColor and with excellent performances. The film posits the theory that falling in love is like dancing on air, which Astaire does in a nice sequence set in and above Washington Square. Astaire is especially given a chance to shine in his "Dancing Man" number where he combines his trademark elegance with his major terpsichorean skill. Leading lady Vera-Ellen, even considering that she's playing an upright, "moral" type (the film has some similarities to Guys and Dolls), often looks as if she's afraid her makeup is going to crack, but she's more than competent; her singing voice is dubbed. Marjorie Main is her usual delightful self as the grumpy but forgiving aunt, and Alice Pearce nearly steals the picture as Angela's friend, Elsie. (There's a touching moment when Elsie stands in for Angela at the wedding rehearsal and a sad, hopeful look slowly comes across her sweet homely face.) The reasonably pleasant songs by Warren and Mercer seem to be the type that might need to grow on you, although "Naughty But Nice" is well-performed by Vera-Ellen and then comically reprised by Pearce. Gale Robbins, Clinton Sundberg, and Keenan Wynn are very adept in supporting roles, and even Percy Helton has a bit as one of Angela's legion of admirers, giving her flowers at the opening. 

Verdict: Call it piffle if you will, but there's a lot of talent and charm on display. ***.

PLEASE DON'T EAT THE DAISIES

David Niven and Doris Day

PLEASE DON'T EAT THE DAISIES (1960). Director: Charles Walters.

Kate MacKay (Doris Day) and her husband, Larry (David Niven of Enchantment) are raising four adorable if rambunctious boys and planning a move to the country. Larry, a professor of drama, is made a theater critic for a top newspaper. In a contrived event, he is assigned to review his best friend, Alfred's (Richard Hadyn), new musical, and not only slams it, but prints that the leading lady, Deborah Vaughn (Janis Paige of This Side of the Law), has no talent. This leads into amusing encounters between Larry and Deborah as well as an opportunity for Alfred to get a kind of revenge on Larry. Meanwhile Kate is worried that her husband is turning into the kind of justifiably-abhorred critic who is more interested in making clever jokes at a playwright's expense than in writing serious and fair-minded theater reviews. If you take some of the improbable developments (they move into a house that resembles a castle) with a grain of salt, Please Don't Eat the Daisies is a delightful comedy, with the two leads in top form. Day and Niven work very well together and seem to be having as much fun as the audience. Some of the critical words that come out of the mouth of Doris' mother make her seem like a monster, but the casting of sweet Spring Byington makes her character more palatable.  Patsy Kelly plays the housekeeper but isn't given much of a chance to shine, although Hadyn scores as the angry Alfred, and Paige is just wonderful and very sexy as Deborah. Jack Weston is also fine as a taxi-driving wannabee playwright, and Kathryn Card of I Love Lucy appears briefly as a principal. The business with the baby being kept in a locked cage would raise eyebrows today and frankly makes little sense. (The rationale is that he can pick locks, but wouldn't that include the locks on his cage?) Please Don't Eat the Daises -- the title comes from a reference to one of the boys eating flowers -- is based on a novel by Jean Kerr, a playwright who was married to Walter Kerr, best-known as a theater critic for the N.Y. Times; the couple had six children. Doris does a reprise of "Que sera, sera" from The Man Who Knew Too Much and also nicely warbles the title tune and "Anyway the Wind Blows."

Verdict: Very amusing and well-acted comedy with an especially winning Day. ***.

EASY TO LOVE

EASY TO LOVE (1953). Director: Charles Walters.

In Cypress Gardens, Julie Hallerton (Esther Williams of Raw Wind in Eden) works for Ray Lloyd (Van Johnson) as a highly successful swimming spokes model for various products and he's not about to let her go. Julie keeps hoping that Ray, a slave driver who rarely lets her have any time off, will propose to her, but just in case she has a handsome boyfriend, also a model, named Hank (John Bromfield of Crime Against Joe). "I bet you've never even seen him with his clothes on," Ray tells Julie. If that weren't enough, Julie meets crooner Barry Gordon (Tony Martin of Casbah) while on assignment in New York and dares to stay up late the night before a gig to have a wonderful romantic date with him. Back in Florida, Julie finds herself pursued by Hank and Barry even as she keeps pursuing Ray in her own way. The question is why? Most sensible women would quickly throw off the unpleasant, recalcitrant Ray (whose unlikable character isn't even redeemed by his being played by the likable Johnson) and take up with one of the two hunks who are dying for her hand in marriage. But Johnson was the bigger star so he gets the girl. Easy to Love is easy to take and just as easy to forget, although the performances are fine (Bromfield in particular makes a nice impression) and there are some pleasant song numbers, a smashing ballet on water skis, a romantic swim between Williams and Bromfield, a charming number with Tony Martin and some elderly ladies, and for good measure a brief appearance by pre-stardom Carroll Baker as one of Ray's jealous girlfriends. Production numbers designed and directed by Busby Berkeley. 

Verdict: Can't stop that Esther when she's wet! **1/2.

JUMBO

JUMBO (aka Billy Roses' Jumbo/1962). Director: Charles Walters.

"Pop" Wonder (Jimmy Durante) is the owner of a circus that is in real financial trouble -- the only real asset is an elephant named Jumbo --  none of which is helped by Pop's gambling. Against her better wishes, his daughter, Kitty (Doris Day), hires a stranger, Sam (Stephen Boyd), who claims to have experience as a trapeze artist. But Sam may have a connection to a man who is trying to take over Pop's circus against his wishes. A developing romance between Kitty and Sam is threatened by these revelations. This circus-themed musical is based on a Rodgers and Hart stage play, and their songs are the highlights of the movie: 'This Can't Be Love;" "My Romance;" "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World;" etc. The elephant Jumbo's act is also quite amazing. Day [Pillow Talk] is perky and efficient if sexless, Boyd [Ben-Hur] is better than you'd expect in this kind of material, Durante [The Great Rupert] as lovable as ever, and Martha Raye as his love interest is ... cute. Her bit pretending to be a lioness is devoid of mirth, but her stint as a human cannonball is a bit funnier. The screenplay was by Sidney Sheldon, and Busby Berkeley was second unit director.

Verdict: Just when you think it's over, it goes on and on and on. **1/2.